MONCTON, N.B. April 4, 2009 — Canada's Kevin Martin opened his title defence at the Ford world men's curling championship in winning fashion Saturday night at the Moncton, Coliseum.

Martin's half-Edmonton (Martin, second Marc Kennedy) and half-Calgary (third John Morris, lead Ben Hebert) turned back Yusuke Morozumi of Japan 7-4 in Draw 2 play in pursuit of a second straight world title.

After a tight first four ends, when both teams were hampered by frosty ice conditions, Martin broke the game open by scoring three in the fifth end on the young Japanese team.

"We didn't take any chances at all," said Martin. "We just basically played it the way we thought we'd have to — stay close for the first few ends and try to break it open in the middle ends and carry it through. I definitely didn't want to have to draw four-foot in the end."

Canada plays two games on Sunday — against Thomas Dufour of France at noon (all times Eastern) and Fengchun Wang of China at 6:30 p.m.

Jiri Snitil of the Czech Republic, meanwhile, handed Denmark's Ulrik Schmidt his second loss of the day, romping to a 9-4 victory. Snitil (1-1) took a 3-2 lead into the sixth end before scoring four, and he never looked back.

Also, Dufour made an angle-raise takeout with his last rock of the game for a 7-5 win over China in the opening game for both squads. The teams traded three-enders in the eighth and ninth ends to give France a one-point lead going into the 10th, but China had shot rock covering the lid to force Dufour to attempt, and make, the game-winning shot.

In the other Draw 2 affair, Finland blew a valuable opportunity to gain some ground in the race to qualify for the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, bowing 9-1 to Thomas Ulsrud of Norway. Finland gave up steals of one, one, one and two over the first four ends before getting on the board with one in the fifth. Then in the sixth, Norway scored four and the teams shook hands.

John Shuster of the U.S. (1-0), Ralph Stoeckli of Switzerland (1-0), David Murdoch of Scotland (0-1) and Andy Kapp of Germany all had byes.

On Sunday, draws are scheduled for 6:30 a.m., noon and 6:30. TSN is televising the Canadian games (noon and 6:30), while coverage also is available at curltv.com.